


Dear Jude

by Medorikoi



Category: Across the Universe (2007)
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Vietnam War, War Era
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-15
Updated: 2011-04-15
Packaged: 2017-10-18 02:54:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,319
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/184235
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Medorikoi/pseuds/Medorikoi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Max writes home from Nam throughout his tour but something is wrong back in the world...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Dear Jude.

How awkward does that sound? So formal…My Dearest Judey, I guess you'll be seeing it a lot, its only been two days, I've only been in Nam for a few hours and I am writing it. I almost wrote sooner actually…I just had this though in my head that the second I got here I would be bombarded with bullets, that it would just start and never end, but I am here, and I am still okay. Anyway, I almost wrote you earlier because we will probably never see each other again, at least not while I'm alive anyway. Don't- I know you are going to say I am not going to die. That we were all pretending I was just going away on vacation, that I will be okay and come home…I can't function thinking like that Judey, I don't believe it, I am going to function like I am not going to get out of here alive. I won't mention it again for you, but know that that is why I can tell you these things.

When we said goodbye it was good, I hugged everyone, everyone told me that they loved me, and I loved them back and its true and I don't regret it but even as I drove off I knew what I should have said. Sure I love everyone, they are my friends, my family, but I have had so many friends and you are the first one that ever really mattered. I just wanted you to know.

Things are okay here, calm, wet. So no matter what I say don't worry about me okay? Tell Lucy I love her. Tell everyone I am okay. Don't show them this letter.

Love, Max

 

 

Dear Jude

I am finally at an address you can mail me at, I put it on the back of the envelope. I don't know how the mail would find me but everyone here seems to get mail from home so I guess it works- at least sometimes. I am still alive, joining up with my company today, they suffered heavy casualties on their last operation- guess they need replacements. Its still raining- I haven't seen the sun since I got here- its like I will never be dry again.

I don't know why I am telling you these things, I don't want you to worry, I think- I think maybe I just don't want to be forgotten. I'm still here. I'm still alive. Life goes on…and I am not a part of it. I'm sorry, thank you. For reading this, for letting me torture you like this. I'm a lot more open in letters than I am in person hu? I guess it is because there are no more repercussions. If I tell you everything the only person I hurt is you, you can worry. I on the other hand will never have to look you in the eyes and know that you know I am afraid. It is okay to have someone with a perfect knowledge of yourself, a prefect judge, if you will never see them again to let them judge.

I'm sorry. I guess I will always be sorry. I love you.

Love Max

 

 

Dear Jude

Thank you for giving the address to everyone, its good to hear about the real world. When I am reading their letters its like I am there, or at least not here. I memorized all of them I've read them so many times. I wrote them all back, I told them I am okay, that the weather sucks, that I am safe for now, don't tell them otherwise even when I tell you okay? My Judey, my unwilling diary. I don't think I have ever written as much as I have in the last few days and all of it to you- I can't tell the guys here, the ones I am suppose to fight with, the ones I am suppose to watch die. I cant bring myself to invest myself in people here because I know I couldn't watch anyone at home die because I love them, if I loved these people it would kill me. I so wish you were here with me, I'm an idiot and sentimental and all of these things I never thought before I left but I miss you- I am so glad you are not here though Judey, I couldn't watch you die here and live. I couldn't.

It's okay that you haven't written me back. I understand. I'm torturing you and we both know it. I'm not acting like myself and I am utterly dependent on you and it isn't fair. But I am going to keep writing you if it's just the same to you. I can pretend you are reading and If you aren't its okay, I will never have to know. Like I said before..i just need to tell someone and I have no one to tell. You are it for me Judey.

Love Max

 

 

Dear Jude,

I am sorry I haven't written in a few days but I have been on an operation- no letters in or out- so much for easing into the war. You wouldn't recognize me if you saw me Judey, my hair is short now, military cut, rifle in my arms, I haven't shaved in days, haven't bathed in two weeks. It almost makes me happy I wont have to come home, I think it would break Lucys heart if she saw me like this. I feel- or maybe I don't feel- Jude, being here, seeing this is like killing part of myself, like childhood is being taken from me- not that I should still be a child but I sure as hell feel like one here.

I'm still okay, I'm alive, healthy. They feed me, two meals a day, I would ask for a package but I don't think you are reading these letters are you Judey? I wonder do you check the dates on the envelope. Think to yourself yes, seven days ago Max was alive?

Jude I still love you, if you read anything I hope it is that. I love you.

-Max

 

 

Dear Jude

I wrote Lucy again and I finally asked her about you, just asked if you were doing okay, I didn't want her to be suspicious that you didn't respond that you don't love me anymore. How melodramatic does that sound? Oh Jude the things you do to me. She sent me a sketch you did, it's dated the day I left. It of us, you and me, and we are saying goodbye, holding on so tight that we would never have to let go- I'm practically wrapped around you. It beautiful Jude, I hope you don't mind I have it now because I am not giving it back- I live within it- in the world. It's safe in plastic in my pack.

I focus on the world out there because I can't focus on here-now. I'm so scarred Jude- everyday rumors come in, where we are going, stories of midnight ambushes, of suicide detours they make us go on. There is a rumor that my company will have to patrol victory road at night, they own the night. Everyday there is gunfire, explosions, talk of death, which letter to you will be my last?

 

 

 

 

Dear Jude.

Sorry I haven't written. I'm…alive…

Love Max

 

 

Dear Jude

The rumors were right Judey, we were sent to patrol at night. The third night it happened, I don't even know how, I never saw them. There was light, a burst of gun fire and then another. Two thuds, one on either side of me. Then only screaming.

There was so much blood, shot through the heart, I don't think he ever knew It happened. His eyes were dead before he hit the ground. The thud that turned to screaming, he was on my right, shot through the knee, shrapnel, he was screaming and screaming. I couldn't help him- he grabbed me, begged, screamed. I held him until the bursts ended and the medics came over. They gave him morphine but it didn't help, nothing would stop his screaming. I don't think I will ever stop hearing his screams. Another medic pushed me back, down next to the dead man, he wad talking, saying..something…I don't know. I couldn't understand him. Hands all over me-checking me but it wasn't me- I was covered in their blood, the dead man and the one that couldn't stop screaming, begging to die, then not to die. Jude I was in the middle, I should be dead, dead like them. The screaming marine died, he hemorrhaged, he never stopped screaming.

Thank god for that plastic Judey, I couldn't stand it if this blood that covers me tainted the only part of the world I have left- that sketch is all I have left in the world- of the world- of you. It is the only thing left in existence that isn't red.

 

 

 

Dear Jude

It is thanksgiving. To think that this time last year I was at home with you. Safe. So young, Jude it think I age 10 years a minute here, how old am I now? We each got a Pepsi today, Happy Thanksgiving.

I enclosed a picture of myself, two of them actually. One with no shirt, smiling at the camera, at least I think it's a smile. Maybe it's a grimace. The other I didn't know about when it was being taken- going through the jungle, I think you can actually see the deaths I have seen in my eyes. They told me to send them to my girlfriend, that either one would delay a Dear John letter, who could dump me when I look as sad as I do? Honestly I would love to get a Dear John letter from you Judey, just to hear from you yourself that you still exist, that the world I will never see again still exists. Then again does it matter? If I pretend you exist, that you care then I can live in that belief. Living is easy with eyes closed, but you know I know when it's a dream.

I live in a dream, your strawberry fields Judey.

Love Max

 

 

 

Dear Judey,

Christmas day, no cease fire, no calm, no snow, no santa clause, no family, no you. I did get a letter from Lucy and one from Sadie, they both say everything is okay, to stay safe, to come home. They say your okay too. That's as good a present as I can ask for. Jude, I am sick and tired of this, I am done being afraid, feeling like I am never going to be warm again, like nothing is ever going to be okay again. Nothing is real. I'm sick of writing to a person who doesn't exist, at least not to me. I have forgotten the shade of your eyes, the exact resonance of your voice, of the wit you once pitted against me. My world has faded and I am so very afraid and at the same time I am not afraid at all. This may very well be my last letter you Judey, my last letter to anyone. I have written the others, hell I even wrote my parents, saying I love them, all of them. Even if I don't. I volunteered for an operation Jude and I don't think I am coming back from this one. I was meant to die a long time ago and fate is about to catch up. We are going on foot through the jungle, recovering god knows what and coming back- the percent of casualties expected- Jude I love you. I love you as a friend. I love you as the person in my mind- the person I told everything to who will never judge me because he will never see me again and never wrote me. Judey I love you with everything I am- everything I was and everything I will never get to be. Jude I love you- I love only you. Forever. Goodbye Judey.

I love you –Max


	2. Chapter 2

It had been two days, maybe three, the night seemed to stretch into weeks and the sun was always blotted out in the rainy hours of daylight where they felt foolishly just a little bit less terrified. Max didn't know, didn't really care, there was only his next letter to the man who never wrote back, the soft promises of tomorrow echoing from pages from Lucy, this terrifying existence of pain and hunger was nothing, another day down out of his two year life sentence. They were still days away from their target and every day the jungle grew denser around them, forcing them through leech water that literally sucked what little life they had out of them, through little holdouts which they massacred and then bombed.

Max was adjusting his helmet, throwing his awkwardly long blond hair behind his ear, he hated seeing it, another target for the enemy to see, a constant reminder of those pictures he had sent home, how young he looked, how lost and scared. It was another reminder of the world which he would never see again. He never saw a thing, never shot a round, he wouldn't have known where to aim anyway, he heard it though, the quick snapping of gunfire. He meant to hit the ground, but instead he was falling backwards, splayed out like he was making a snow angel in the muck. The sun had come out, everything was a blinding white light that washed out this hellish jungle, he couldn't see guns or men or the enemy, and for one glorious second he was at home, Lucy and Jude holding him tight and promising to never let go. But like all rays of sunshine in Nam the white light was gone in a second and in its wake there was pain, confusion and blood.

There was more snapping, more gun fire, over and over, the sound filling the air, screaming of wounded and fighting melding and turning into a roar that pounded against his ears. He couldn't move, couldn't shield himself, but maybe that blanket of red would do it for him, it covered him completely, seeping into his eyes and turning the sky as red as he was. He wanted to go back home-back to Jude and Lucy- he wanted to hold onto that dream- he wished the pounding in his head would stop long enough for him to focus, the stabbing across his side to ease.

"Carrigan!" The gun fire had stopped but the screaming only got louder, a man was bending over him, adding to the roar in his head. "Carrigan!" Max blinked, what else could he do? Did this man know that he was so covered in blood that his teeth and eyes were stained with it? Thick fingers stabbed into his neck and retreated, waves of pain rolled over him, Max was going to be sick, but only if he didn't pass out first.

"He is alive! Get him out of here!" And then…there was nothing.

There were flashes of sound and places, the whir of a helicopter, sterile white rooms as alien as the jungle and finally a blur of everything, people, rooms, cars, doctors, they spoke and prodded and stabbed and in a flash they were gone. Gone like Jude and Lucy were gone.

The first time Max realized that he had been injured was sitting in a hospital bed stateside, the TV flickering soundlessly in front of himself and the mindless drones of his fellow patents. He was alive. He was alive but when he asked for mail the nurse had nothing to give to him, he was alive without a purpose, without a home, there would be no next letter to Jude.

Time passed the same way here as it did in Nam, the days were dark and without hope, only slightly less terrifying than the nights which lasted for weeks. Max counted the days here just the same as he had there, one less day of his two year sentence, how many days had he missed in the blur?

When seven days had passed, seven days closer to his freedom which would never come, Lucy arrived. He was in New York, he didn't know places like this existed in New York; it had been so vibrant once. Lucy sat by his side, holding his hand, begging him to talk to her. But didn't she understand that he wasn't the Max she loved? He had died in a field of muck in Nam like an angel, trying to get home to her. This Max knew that home was in that vision, the vision which he should have ended his life with. Lucy and New York weren't home unless there was Jude, Jude who read every letter he wrote, who waited with bated breath and cried for him and his lost innocents, Jude who never existed in the first place.

It was another three days towards freedom, hiding in this hospital that felt like war with Lucy at his side, that she dropped a letter into his lap when she kissed him goodbye, telling him that it was from Jude. Max watched her leave out of the corner of his eye, then looked down at the paper he held, the heavy scratching lines undoubtedly Jude's hand writing, the return address in Liverpool. Max took a breath and it felt like life.

The letter was unopened, addressed only to their address, no name, as hastily written as the letter inside it. 'I'm coming home'.

The next day Max heard Lucy when she spoke, he heard that Jude had been deported the same week he had shipped out, he heard that they had been afraid to tell him of all the bad things happening at home. Max smiled while Lucy spoke of all the bad things, they weren't bad, they were life, they meant that Jude, his Jude who would cry for him and write to him and love him was real and was coming home to him.

The days passed by like lifetimes as they always had and nights stretched for eternities but every one that passed Max knew was a day closer not to the end of his servitude but a day closer to the home he thought he lost. He listened and even talked a little to make Lucy smile, he tried to smile himself but it felt unnatural on his face, forced and alien, so he just watched Lucy. He walked himself around, waking atrophied muscles, ate the rations they passed as food because it was a precursor to the life he wanted back. He nodded at all the right places when the doctors and nurses asked him questions, yes he knew where he was, who he was, and finally yes, he knew how to take care of himself, take care of his injuries on his own.

Walking out of the hospital that day felt like seeing the sun for the first time. Lucy brought the car but Max refused, he wanted to see it, the life, the color, he needed to see how life went on without him, that the world was still the world he had left. When he walked the stairs to their flat and all his friends poured out, holding him, smiling, talking a roar of joyous sounds he knew that the world was just as he had left it and the only part left to recover was his own.

No one stopped Max as he walked into the room that had always been dominated by Jude no matter who shared it with him. The paintings on the walls were already fading to a color Jude had never seen in them and the old sheets and cloths that lay on the bed smelled of nothing but stale life, no matter how hard he tried to find Jude. Yet the room comforted him, he could see the splattering of dozens of different paints on the floor, even flecking onto the walls where Jude had been too engrossed to wipe it off. The old coat that lay untouched on the dresser reminded him of the first cold days in Princeton that they had met, the easy bond they shared, how Max had loved the way Jude looked in his coat and told him to keep it.

It was two days until Max found the home he had longed for since the moment he left it. He waited for three hours on the cold hood of the taxi he drove, numb to everything, paralyzed by fear now that the moment was so close at hand that something would go wrong. It was waiting with bated breath to see who would fall, where the next gush of red would pour from to wait to see if this boat of cold metal held his life within it.

The sun was a blinding white light, smearing the details of the people coming forward until the very end, when a horde of people disappeared and all that was left was Jude.

"JUDE JUDE JUDEY JUDEY JUDEY!" His vocal chords protested in agony as he spoke more in an instant than he had in the past month and all the frozen tense muscles in his body leapt and he was finally home. They ran, their bodies collided, and Max wrapped himself around him, pressed his face into hair and neck, mewling the name over and over "Jude Judey Judey", being held so tight he thought he could never escape, would never want to.

God. They spoke. They laughed, they touched. Max lived more in those first five minutes with Jude than the accumulation of his entire life until now. He was free, this was the moment he had been waiting for his whole life, he wasn't lost, wasn't broken, he was finally fucking home.


	3. Chapter 3

The world tilted and then was full of fragrant, precious, blonde. "Max." Jude whispered into his friend's hair, holding him tight, secure in his arms so that Max wouldn't have to touch the ground, Jude would willingly carry him. He could hear Max whispering over and over but he couldn't make out the soft mumbled words, Jude held him tighter.

They made it to the bright yellow taxi Max had been waiting on, Jude was surprised when Max lowered his legs from their home around Jude's waist, smiling as he opened the driver's side door and motioned for Jude to follow suit. Jude soaked it up as Max drove them, the look of him, the sound, the way his laughter made his own heart sing. The way he was so very alive.

They spoke the whole trip like they had never been apart; like nothing had changed between them, even if they themselves had changed they were still Max and Jude. Max never spoke a word however about where they were going; the one time Jude asked all he got was a playful smile, after that he really didn't care where they went.

A huge crowd was forming where Max parked, all of them staring up at the sky. They got out and locked the doors and immediately found themselves migrating together, hands touching, shoulders brushing, each trying to protect and guide the other as they pushed through the throngs of people, it didn't matter that neither succeeded.

Cops were stationed all around the base of the building but Max put a finger to his smiling lips and held Jude's hand in his own, silently guiding them to an unguarded back door. Their laughter echoed through the stairwell as they raced up to the roof, stopping dead before they pushed past the final door, Jude unsure of what he would find and Max unsure of his self, their clasped hands intertwined and they stepped out into the sunlight.

Everyone was there, their entire impromptu family scattered about the roof, Sadie and JoJo at two of the microphones set up, happy in each other's company, Lucy watching the duo sing and Prudence…who came running and screaming towards them.

"JUDE! YOUR HOME!" The girl tackled Jude into a hug, releasing him only to give one to Max as well, taking him from his place behind Jude and throwing him into the mix. The song ended and the crowd on the roof turned, rushing towards them, clasping, touching, holding. Jude accepted all of their welcomes with grace and a smile but never lost his hold on Max, never letting him drift farther than an arm's length away. He could feel the blond straining to stay behind him, using Jude as a shield against the on slaughter, Jude didn't miss his companion's new found silence. The crowd rushed back to their places as the mob below bellowed for another song, Lucy motioned for them to come up to one of the microphones. Max took a step back but Jude wrapped his arm around his friend's waist, his hand resting gently on Max's hip, holding him as they approached the mike.

Instruments sounded around them, and everyone turned to them. Jude could feel the eyes of their friends upon them, he could feel Max withdrawing in his arms, pulling back to hide, pulling away from him, he couldn't get Max to look him in the eye, he had him for less than a hour and he was already losing the battle they needed to fight together. Max gave up, he burrowed into Jude's shoulder, hiding his face in the warm leather. Out of the corner of his eye Jude saw Lucy point to the microphone and smile.

Jude took a deep breath and took a shuffling step forward, holding Max tight and facing the microphone all on his own.

"There is nothing you can do that can't be done, nothing you can sing that can't be sung, nothing you can say but you can learn how to play the game, it's easy." Jude felt the intake of breath against his chest, Max arranging himself in Jude's arms so he could hear him just a bit better.

"There is nothing you can make that can't be made, no one you can save that can't be saved, nothing you can do but you can learn how to be you in time. It's easy." Jude crushed the blond against him, smiling suddenly and pressing a kiss to Max's bowed head.

"All you need is love. All you need is love. All you need is love. Love. Love is all you need." Jude didn't see the crowd below him, nor was the gaggle of his friends surrounding him, to him all the world Max gently lifting his face into the sun, unraveling in his arms like he was the child he once was.

"Love. Love. Love." Sadie and Prudence sang softly behind them, beautifully twining with the delicate instruments, Max turned his face to see them, pulling gently from his haven in Jude's arms, standing alone save for the hand still linked to Jude's Max smiled.

"There's nothing you can know that can't be known." Jude sang over the girls soft reprieve, drawing Max's glittering eyes back to himself "Nothing you can see that isn't shown." Jude returned Max's gentle smile and hoped more than anything that Max could feel how very important these words were, that they echoed through his soul, willing them to be true. "Nowhere you can be that isn't where you're meant to be." Max laughed, carefree and easy, safe, the brilliant vivacious Max Jude had fallen in love with so long ago. "It's easy."

Everyone was laughing, clapping, fucking living. No one remained silent; a choir of voices poured forth, music was heard in the streets. "All you need is love!"

Max twirled in Jude's arms, laughing, letting the brunette catch him when the world kept spinning. Their hands fell together, pressing, balancing each other as they swayed back and forth, an almost waltz, their faces brought close. "All you need is love. Love. Love is all you need." Jude sang to him, only him.

Max twirled them faster, he was shinning, a blinding light. "Love is all you need!" He sang again and again and it felt like it was true. Like if he could live in this love forever he would never need to breathe, to eat, to drink, that this feeling would be enough for eternity.

"All you need is love. Love. Love is all you need." Max sang and Jude heard no other. The song crescendoed and trailed off around them, people were filled with love and joy. But Max and Jude found something much better as they stared into each other. All they needed was love, all they needed was each other.

Sirens whirred and lights flashed, ripping everyone from their beautiful utopia, eyes faded and the last notes turned sour, it was time to go. The group of them fled through the back entranceway threw which Max and Jude had made their entrance, if anyone noticed the two reunited best friends never released their hold on one another they kept their silence.

It was almost too easy to escape; Max led them down, slipping through the crowd and cops alike. The six of them stood in a semicircle around the little taxi in which Max and Jude had arrived. But they had escaped, they were free, Prudence's laugh rang through the air.

Max pressed himself into Jude's side and tossed the keys to Jojo, waiting for him and Sadie, the largest of their group, to take their places in the front. Another bout of laughter erupted as they forced themselves into the back of the cramped taxi. They didn't open both doors, better to press someone against it, Jude volunteered, pulling a grinning Max in behind him. They sat hip to hip, crushed up against each other as Lucy and Prudence climbed in awkwardly, Lucy ending up shutting the door behind her with her crouched on the floor and Prudence.

"Hey Luce." Max laughed at his sisters precarious position, "Didn't mom ever tell you to wear your seat belt in the car?" In days gone by Lucy would have feigned annoyance but she just stared at him in wonder, Max paused a moment then brought a tentative hand to his face. He was smiling, he didn't even notice, here, like this, his smile didn't feel so alien.

"And what about your seatbelt?" Jude asked so that Max looked away from his beaming sister and twisted awkwardly to look at Jude, scant inches separating their lips.

"I like to live on the edge."

"Then you sit on the edge!" Lucy laughed as she spoke but Jude was already moving, he slipped his arms around Max and pulled until the blond sat in his lap. Max squirmed until his back laid against both the door and Jude's chest, his legs twining with Jude's and just barley touching Prudence as she slid over to make room for Lucy.

"Mmm" Jude breathed into Max's hair, lifting his chin to rest on his friends shoulder, the sides of their faces pressing together as Jude's arms linked over Max's flat belly. "I'll be your seatbelt."

Everyone was watching them, including Jojo who had just started the car but Max didn't notice. "How can I live on edge with a huge smothering seatbelt?"

"Well…"Jude lifted his hips lewdly, blatantly shifting into Max, lifting him into the air. Max laughed and jabbed an elbow at him.

"Okay! I'll go with the seatbelt!"

Jojo rolled his eyes and started their slow way through the scattering crowd, a couple of people gave the two lead singers and the impromptu soloist a second glance but let the taxi plow on. Max was content to let Jojo drive his car, closing his eyes and relaxing back into Jude, letting the other take his weight, trusting him to keep him upright as he slumped, curling himself around Jude. By the time they made it back to the flat Max had lifted one leg onto Prudence's lap and his head was resting on Jude's chest.

"Hey mate-you still with us?" Jude asked softly, not really wanted to disturb Max even as he slid his hand through Max's hair. Blue eyes blinked blearily at him as if he had interrupted a dream.

"Jude!" Lucy tapped on the window from the outside, motioning that she was about to take away their door shaped support system. Lucy opened the door and Jude braced Max against himself, the blond didn't struggle, in fact he collapsed against the softly rising chest and watched them all through half lidded eyes.

Jude swung his legs out of the car and hoisted both of them up, Max's legs falling deftly to the ground, supporting his weight very much against his will. As Jude stretched Max leaned heavily against the car a pout on his lips, his arms coming up like a child asking to be picked up.

"Lazy booger." Jude smiled at his childish friend and turned around, bending so that Max could loop sluggish arms around his neck.

"Aw Max." Lucy shut the car door behind them and walked around them, her hand tentatively reaching up to brush a lock of hair from her brother's face. "You are almost cute when you are docile." Max took the energy to stick his tongue out at her, shifting as he did so so that his face lay pressed against Jude's shoulder.

"I don't care how cute you are mate- just don't drool on me." Jude leaned forward , holding Max's legs up in his arms, he desperately wanted to see what they looked like together now, wanted to see Max serene and trusting, wanted to draw it- he couldn't care less if Max drooled all over him.

They climbed the monstrous stairs, Jude carrying his nearly sleeping charge without a word, he wished he could complain at how heavy his friend was but it was so untrue it was morbid. It felt strange coming back here after so long, like nothing and everything had changed. He expected everything to be different inside but he was shocked at how similar everything was. He wanted it to feel stale like he had left it alone all this time but it didn't.

Everyone filtered around him, taking residence on the couch as Jude took in his surroundings, as weird as it was, it was right.

"Hey, where does this one sleep?" Jude gestured to his charge with a little flourish, causing Max to burrow deeper into the warmth beneath him.

"With you." Jude looked at Lucy, another silent understanding passing unfailingly between them; maybe it was the silent language of loving Max, who knows.

Jude passed easily into his old room, taking in the mix of old and new, things he left behind strewn indiscriminately with Max's things on a backdrop of paintings he stopped seeing a long time ago. A surge of longing went through him, he wanted to paint these walls, make them fresh and new, something beautiful that would fit its new inhabitants, something that would make Max smile, and for that reason make Jude smile.

But the paints on the floor were separated and dried out, there would be time enough later, he had found a new muse, one that he would never let leave him again.

Jude lowered Max onto the bed, straining and twisting so that he could turn and lower his head gently to the pillow. Like his mother had done for him as a child Jude pulled Max's shoes off his feet and let them clatter to the floor, tugging at the blankets until he could cover Max in them, tucking them around his shoulders as blue eyes flickered open and watched him with an indescribable well of emotion.

"Judey-" A slim white hand worked its way out of its entrapments and reached out for him.

"Max." Jude sat on the edge of the bed, clutching the hand held out to him, suddenly at a loss of what to do now that his brilliant Max was no longer smiling.

"Don't want to sleep." Max begged as his eyes drooped lower. Jude bent and kissed his nose, maybe this silent language was one of love because Jude didn't need to hear anymore.

"It's okay now. I'm here; I will be here when you wake." Jude squeezed the hand he held as his friends grip loosened. "And if you wake up and you are afraid I'll help you. You'll never have to be alone again." And that was it, Max was fast asleep, his face younger, more innocent in sleep, the change was subtle but he knew this was how he looked when they first met.

Jude just sat there, watching Max sleep, everything was happening so fast and he didn't want to miss a moment, he couldn't lose this again now that he knew the agony of it all being taken away.

"Jude." Lucy knocked softly on the door frame, walking to where Max lay and gazing down at her brother solemnly. "He was so happy to see you and he gets tired so easily now." She held out her hand as if to touch him but withdrew. "So happy..."

Her eyes sparkled in the dim light and although she smiled it was somehow melancholy, like her whole soul had been subdued. "I'm glad your back." He was tempted to stand, to hold her as he once did but he couldn't, it wasn't who they were anymore, now they knew their love had been a flash in the dark but Max was a blazing sun.

Lucy turned back to the sleeping man, letting time drift by of its own accord, allowing them some semblance of peace before she released the storm. "You have no idea how much he missed you. How he asked about you in letters, wanting to know if you were okay, if you missed him. He always tried so hard to be nonchalant but he missed you so …" Tears welled in her eyes and she wiped at them harshly with the back of her sleeve, unwilling to let them fall. "He wrote to you." Her voice choked, deepened with emotion. "He wrote to you more than anyone else and I never told him you were gone."

Lucy dropped a bundle of letters into his lap, in the darkness Jude could see his own name in Max's scrawl. "I couldn't do it and I told the others not to." Tears streamed down her face and her perfect teeth bit deeply into her lip. "I didn't want him to think he had nothing to come home to, you meant that to him. I just needed him to come home!" She was nearly sobbing, her hands wet with tears. Jude reached out for her but she stepped back, her head shaking a violent no as she stifled her tears. "I did what I had to do to bring him home. Now that he is here he needs you to put him back together again."

Jude wanted to be angry at her, she had let Max think that he couldn't be bothered to write, but he couldn't summon anything but pity. Jude rested a hand on Max's chest, he could feel each rib beneath his palm, hear the anguished murmur as Max moved so that he could hold Jude's hand against himself. Lucy had waited in terror for Max to come home in a bag like her high school love, only to be given a broken rag doll that they said was her brother. She could do nothing to make him eat, to make the tears stop when the night came and darkness fell on him. Lucy was in a hell of helplessness.

Jude watched the whine form on Max's face as he pulled away his hand, glad when frown lines melted once more into innocents.

"He hasn't smiled until today. You gave that to him. You give him life." Lucy didn't touch either of them as she ran from the room, leaving only the stack of stained letters. With a glance to make sure Max was resting peacefully Jude flipped through the envelopes, a military address on the back of one, stains of dirt on all of them, Max's handwriting writing his name over and over, a cry in the night with no response.

It felt almost perverse to carefully open the first letter, reading what he should have months ago when Max was a world away, not twisting through haunted dreams now that the parchment had yellowed.

'Dear Jude' He paused, smiled at the tenderness he found there, his fingertips running over the words, linking his mind to Max's of so long ago.

'…you are the first one that ever really mattered…Love, Max'  
Jude leaned over Max, letter clutched in his hand, and pressed a kiss into his hair, sat back, and read it again.

He carefully folded his letter, these precious words Max had giving to him, putting it back in its dirtied envelope, hands shaking as he reached for another. On and on he read, he watched as the stains grew more pronounced on the paper, as the thin shaky scrawl became small and dark. With every letter he watched his best friend step deeper into darkness, begging for help, begging for him as his world slipped out of site.

Max's voice haunted him, reading the letters to him, whispering again and again into his ear 'I'm sorry. I guess I will always be sorry. I love you.' He could see Max sitting in those foxholes, writing him with sunken cheeks and a broken heart, Max with his innocent blue eyes clutching a gun like it was life.

One by one the letters fell away from him, like the pieces of Max he was watching break with every passing day. A child in the jungle with a gun. Jude felt the bile rise in his throat, the anger swell and knot in the pit of his stomach, no one, least of all his beautiful Max should suffer this, should sacrifice their selves like this. To know that every day may be your last…but for Max…Max was made to suffer more exquisitely. He would die alone and unmissed in an alien land.

'Do you think to yourself yes, seven days ago Max was alive?'

Jude could feel the heat in his eyes, watched the pages blur with tears, only moving the letters from harm as a single tear fell.

'Jude I still love you, if you read anything I hope it is that. I love you.'

Not for the rest of his life would he stop hearing Max whispering below the shots of gunfire, sounds he never really heard. Constant soft goodbyes that never ended in anything but Love because every goodbye was his last. In these letters Max died a thousand deaths, and every moment not spent in the letter Max did not exist, mindless, absent, wandering from letter to letter.

Another letter, maybe he only imagined Max moaning beside him, a desperate breathy gasp. '…so much blood, shot through the heart…' Jude let the stack of envelopes fall as he groped to hold onto Max, tightening his hold to feel the fragile pulse of life in the thin wrist. 'begging to die, then not to die.' This was not strange men dying, this was Max and innocent blue cast against blood red, screaming and pain that would die with the men in the letters but echo forever in Max.

'Thank god for that plastic Judey, I couldn't stand it if this blood that covers me tainted the only part of the world I have left- that sketch is all I have left in the world- of the world- of you. It is the only thing left in existence that isn't red.'

Jude didn't fight the tears that fell from his eyes, only blinked through them and the dark to see the shine of plastic catching the moonlight on top of paper. Pinned over where Max's head now lay still entombed in a plastic cage was an image of themselves, the one Max loved in his letters, the one Jude drew the night Max left and his world began to crumble. It was clean, loved, but Jude couldn't stop seeing the red that was painting his world.

He loosened his grip on Max, hating the fading marks he added to the fragile skin, pulling himself from Max's grasp, failing utterly to ignore the soft whimper that broke his heart.

The letters were back in their piles, glaring at him accusingly for not being there when he was most needed. Two remained and he didn't think he could survive the pain of more. The first one was thick, two pictures fell into his lap facedown, he left them there as he read- Thanksgiving, the day they had decided to run away to New York, to make a go at life- a lifetime ago. Jude didn't touch the pictures as he lifted the envelope, just for a moment he could hold in his mind the glorious image of the past, how Max was vibrant and whole, a student with an easy smile and a soft spot for a certain Brit.

Christmas day, the last letter Max ever wrote to him. 'I'm sick of writing to a person who doesn't exist, at least not to me… I volunteered for an operation Jude and I don't think I am coming back from this one.' This was it, Max's way out of the war, Max's precognitive death; this was the one that Max chose to die on and ended up coming home to him.

'Jude I love you. I love you as a friend. I love you as the person in my mind- the person I told everything to who will never judge me because he will never see me again and never wrote me. Judey I love you with everything I am- everything I was and everything I will never get to be. Jude I love you- I love only you. Forever. Goodbye Judey.  
I love you –Max'

Jude could hear ever word, every dark pained I love you with subdued finality from Max's lips. It wouldn't stop; his mind was filled with it. 'I love you, Goodbye'. Tears streamed down his face, falling into his hands, into his mouth. A tear splashed against a photo and he snatched it up, turning it finally in his hands. Oh God Max.

It was him, his beautiful peaceful childlike Max leaning against the side of a foxhole. Grim covered his slender body, his shirt abandoned at his feet, every rib protruded, the dip of his belly obscene, all of him obscured by a long black rifle which he clutched in his arms. He was so young, a boy with a gun, short blond hair spiked with sweat and dirt, blue eyes trying to be hard for the camera reveling a mix of youth and death. A fallen angel.  
Another picture. Jude sobbed brokenly, fighting for breath as Max stared up at him, frightened and young, begging, fucking terrified, covered in dirt, armed to the teeth and eyes all at once begging to die, then not to die.

Everyone was dying, no, the fighting was over and the dead had died, leaving only a soft heart wrenching sobbing. Max blinked and waited for his surroundings to make sense. Home, in bed, but the sobbing from his dream hadn't stopped. The bed creaked and protested as it shook from the force of the sobs. Jude.

Max watched Jude as he sat on his bedside; head bowed and face glistening with tears, messy black hair failing to obscure any of the pain. Max didn't move, he didn't understand, even as the shoulders he longed to hold quaked he waited. Letters stood in a pile by Jude, dirty and military, one fluttered to the floor as he watched, the writing indecipherable to him but the pictures Jude held in his hands, the ones that Jude wouldn't stop looking at even though each glance brought a fresh round of sobs, he recognized.

"Jude." Max sat up and pulled the shaking man into his arms, expecting acquiescence but not Jude to jump in his arms, to turn so that heavy arms could wrap tight and desperate around him.

"Max. Oh Fuck Max." Jude grabbed everything, constantly moving, pulling, needing them to be one, and Max returned the ferocity, Jude's need fueling his own. It was too much, it wasn't enough, this was the accumulation of his whole life and he needed more. Max finally sunk a hand into Jude's hair, capturing the still trembling lips in a kiss. Max could feel the tears hot against his own cheeks; feel Jude trying to swallow him in their kiss. They fought, they raged, they loved, and finally they broke apart, lungs searing as they gasped sweet oxygen, bodies locked together, breaths mingling.

"You're my Jude." Max gasped, sparing a moment of precious air to press their lips together in a chaste kiss. "You read everything; I have nothing left to hide from you. All this time I thought you didn't really exist and now your mine." Max still couldn't get enough, and he loved it. "You cried for me."

Jude was lost in the most beautiful eyes he had ever seen, eyes that held so much more for them both than he ever dreamed possible. He closed the scant inch separating their mouths, whispering against Max's lips because they both knew what he was going to say.

"I love you too."


End file.
